The 14th Kinoteka Polish Film Festival is already underway, providing a chance for audiences to acquaint themselves with recent Polish cinema. But there is also a welcome retrospective of films by the great, eclectic director Jerzy Skolimowski, who is 77 years old and still going strong. His most recent picture, 11 Minutes, opened the festival last week. He is a painter and former boxer; he co-wrote Polanski’s first film, Knife in the Water; he was once an aspirant jazz musician and in recent times he might pop up in acting roles in anything from David Cronenberg’s Eastern Promises to Avengers Assemble of all things.
His movies are as diverse as his life has been. Deep End, from 1970, concerns a teenage boy (John Moulder-Brown) who becomes infatuated with a female co-worker (Jane Asher) at a London swimming pool. It was inspired by a news story Skolimowksi heard about a precious diamond that had been lost in the snow.
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